Tag Archives: csa awareness month

C is for Child Sexual Abuse

03 Wednesday Apr 2013

Posted by in A2ZChallenge, Causes to Champion, CSAAM

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This year I have been wondering what to write on CSA, I have already written about how its important to protect your sons too, I have already written my own survivor story and while giving it a thought and doing some work for CSA FB page, I came across this poster

Truly shocking and scary isn’t it? Unfortunately now that I have worked with CSA so much I know its true and that scares me even more, 75% of the kids don’t tell you I wonder why, in think the answers lies right around in us, in the way we behave, in the way we try to shoo this topic under wraps and want to turn a blind eye to it, like it never happened, it never happens and it most certainly can’t happen to us

So if a child doesn’t tell you how does a parent/care giver figure out… according to the internet and various manuals I have read, some warnings to watch out would be

  • Acting out in an inappropriate sexual way with toys or objects
  • Nightmares, sleeping problems
  • Becoming withdrawn or very clingy
  • Becoming unusually secretive
  • Sudden unexplained personality changes, mood swings and seeming insecure
  • Regressing to younger behaviours, e.g. bedwetting
  • Unaccountable fear of particular places or people
  • Outburst of anger
  • Changes in eating habits
  • New adult words for body parts and no obvious source
  • Talk of a new, older friend and unexplained money or gifts
  • Self-mutilation (cutting or burning) in adolescents
  • Physical signs, such as, unexplained soreness or bruises around genitals or mouth, sexually transmitted diseases, pregnancy
  • Running away
  • Not wanting to be alone with a particular child or young person

In this I would pay particular attention to the last one, if u child says he doesnt like XYZ and doesn’t want to play with him/her . please please please listen to him. Kids are more intutive then adults are and sometimes just going with their intuitions could help a lot

Apart from watching out for warning signs, another very important thing to do in my opinion is encourage your child, build trust in them so that they come back and talk to u – Open lines of communication with them in all possible ways.

Another important thing to do will be to keep all members of the family educated, it really doesn’t help if you tell your child to be aware and alert and the granny/father comes and tells no u have to trust everyone. Kids can get confused often so make sure the message passed to them is consistent

Keep your child safe, don’t shove CSA under the carpet. Talk about it, act on it NOW c

CSAAM–U need not worry

04 Monday Apr 2011

Posted by in Causes to Champion

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U need not worry is a sentence I get to hear from people a lot, U need not worry for many things ask why? Why because I have a son for a child and not a daughter. When I have a son why should I worry, now the worries could be a whole lot of things, but today I am here to talk to you about worries about Child Sexual Abuse.

Its a common misconception (along with many other gender myths) that boys are not vulnerable to Child Sexual Abuse. According to National Study on Child Sexual Abuse (its a downloadable pdf) boys and girls are vulnerable to Child Sexual Abuse. It also goes on to say that boys find it more difficult to disclose about abuse than girls and we still go ahead and hardly pay any attention to the boys when we are talking about CSA. Why? In sheer numbers it states

An estimated 150 million girls and 73 million boys under 18 have experienced forced sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual violence involving physical contact. (across the globe, its quotes a UN study for that)

73 million and we still say you don’t have to worry because you have a son. Infact among the sample that they interviewed the result is

Among respondents, 48% of boys and 39% of the girls faced sexual abuse

U wanna still say I don’t have to worry? I think its a inherit part of our culture which makes us believe that boys are above all this. We as a society don’t want to handle the CSA issue because for us the issue is not about invading the child’s privacy, is not about the hurt that the child goes through. Its about the SHAME that the incident will bring to the family and traditionally its only a girl who can bring shame to the family.

Also I think the term vulnerable and boys really don’t go hand in hand at all, boys are always portrayed and taught to be the macho ones, ones who can handle anything infact I will go far to say ones that will inflict pain rather be a victim to it, thats the role we have difficulty accepting our sons in but victims naah,I never believed in it but since I have had a son and one who is a gentle soul I know how untrue this thinking is. Girls or boys, both can be aggressive, both can be soft… Both can be victims.

Tulir shared  this link on the CSA FB wall sometime back. The site contains some excellent posters which talk of the specific challenges men can face in relation to speaking about sexual abuse

One of the them says

If I tell you I was sexually abused, will you..

…judge me?

…believe me?

…see me as less of a man?

…question my sexuality?

…think I will abuse?

…listen?

There is another one which says

If a man is meant to

…always appear strong

…control his emotions

….be self reliant

… not be a victim

How can he tell you

…he is struggling

…he is scared of losing control

…he feels alone

…he was sexually abused

There is a comment by arun in madmomma’s post which asks

Why is that this comment section so dominated by females? I always thought that it is easy to get boys then girls.. coz of typical indian mentality

I think the above is what directly answers that and that is also something I strongly believe in, this is what I had replied to him

boys (now men) are even more ashamed to accept that they have been abused. We always teach boys to be macho, to be strong… nothing can hurt them yet someone came and abused them? now how can they share this with the world.

According to me its high time we start accepting the fact that boys can we abused too, boys can be tarnished too and stop being so careless with them. I  have a 3 yr old son and I get a lot of slack from people that I am raising him to be too shielded, that I am a paranoid mother, that I guard him too much. Me I have just one thing to say better be paranoid than sorry.

Guard your daughter but please don’t forget to guard your son too, at a young age they are both clueless both need the love and the protection

PS: My post on how I deal with my paranoia and teach my son about private parts coming up soon, but read this informative post by Sue on how to protect your boys

Child Sexual Abuse Awareness Month–April 2011

28 Monday Mar 2011

Posted by in CSAAM

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When we were coming back from Lavasa, a general chat with Kiran and some other bloggers in the taxi on the way back turned towards Child Sexual Abuse and how it is one of the worst things to happen to a child. Kiran suggested that we do a Child Sexual Abuse Awareness month across the blogsphere and the idea appealed to me. As a subject its really close to my heart. I have been abused when I was a child and I know how traumatic it is, I have known some victims who were severely abused and it affected their life as an adult. And the worst part which I feel is that its one of those things which is hushed under the carpet.

So across the month of April 2011, over 40 bloggers in the blogosphere will come together to post on various aspects of Child Sexual Abuse in a bid to create awareness about an issue which affects over 50 per cent of children. This, the Child Sexual Abuse Awareness Month April 2011, will run across their blogs as well as the CSA blog, which will be . In addition to these posts, the CSAAM blog will feature survivor stories, posts by experts and NGOs working in these fields. Through this concerted effort we hope to bring Child Sexual Abuse out of the closet and teach parents how to educate their children about predators, preventing their children from being abused and knowing how to deal with such a situation should it occur. Our children deserve a safe and happy childhood.

So come join us in the effort and Keep your child safe.

If you would like to add to the discussion or know somebody else who would, please note that we welcome entries

The list of topics is available here. Anonymous contributions are accepted and requests for anonymity will of course be honoured. I will probably be hosting at least one guest post and encourage you to do the same for non-blogging friends.

Please remember to send in a mail with all necessary links or just your input to csa.awareness.april@gmail.com so that we can track your contribution and make sure that it is not inadvertently lost or something.

U can also support it simply by adding our the logo of the initiative in your blog’s sidebar. Grab the below code to do so